Edun “Bird of Prey” Fall Winter 2012 Campaign by Ryan McGinley

After a successful debut campaign, photographer, Ryan McGinley, returns to work once again for Edun – the “ethically & socially responsible” fashion line from Bono and Ali Hewson.  The new Fall Winter 2012 Edun “Birds of Prey” campaign features five birds – four owls and a peregrine falcon – alongside models Miles McMillan, Zen S. & Grace Bol. All five birds are indigenous to Africa where the line produces more than 40 percent of their collection. The new Ryan McGinley Edun campaign launches September 2012.

Faraday Porteur Electric Bicycle

You are looking at the prototype of the Faraday Porteur Electric Bicycle—a real stunner, with lithium batteries housed in the frame, active pedal assist, sensors that gauge your pedaling and LED lights in front and back. Faraday Bicycles, the San Francisco-based company behind the bike is looking for funding through Kickstarter. This is one of the few electrics we have seen that looks less like a kiddie crotch rocket and more like a classic pedaler; would be good to see them on the streets.

EXCLUSIVE: Ayami Nishimura X Rankin

“A lot of people call me a fashion photographer and I do love fashion,” says Rankin, the Dazed & Confused co-founder whose portraiture and film and television work has been at the forefront of the rag trade’s avant-garde image game since the nineties. But the Another Magazine and Another Man publisher who recently launched the biannual glossy The Hunger, has something of a shocking confession to make: “I think that I’ve got an innate sense of beauty more than I have of fashion.” As anyone who has seen the 200-page beauty book he published with Illamasqua creative director and frequent Dazed contributor Alex Box can attest, Rankin makes a good point—which is why he has spent the better part of the last two years engrossed in pigments, paint pots, and pencils in an effort to help bring Japanese makeup artist Ayami Nishimura’s work to life.

“I’ve worked with hundreds of makeup artists and there are only a few of them that really inspire you in [this] way,” Rankin says of Nishimura, a boundary-pusher in her own right, who has been sought out by performers like M.I.A. and Lady Gaga for her special brand of no-fear face painting—and who he has been working with on Dazed shoots for about six years. “Not to say the others aren’t good, but it’s just that these guys [like Ayami] have stories to tell and they want to tell them. [She] has just got brilliant ideas; very original that really surprise you. My brief for the book was, ‘Do what you feel, Ayami. Free range—just go for it.’”

And go for it she did. “It was all about what I wanted to say and what I was interested in,” says Nishimura, the self-taught wunderkind who likes to blend traditional Japanese elements with “modern, crazy things like the colorful, full-on fashions.” The large-format tome’s subsequent pages provide a glimpse into Nishimura’s world, which focuses on the confluence of futuristic themes and the soft, innocent beauty of nature. Images range from a model with her head immersed in a tank full of multihued plastic fish (”we wanted it be fun and humorous,” Nishimura explains) to a classically stunning image of a woman with a flower covering her mouth (roses are an ongoing motif throughout the book).

The cover shot (above) was the most challenging, according to Nishimura, but also her favorite. “I wanted to do makeup like an alien. It was really difficult and we tested the formula about 15 times on my assistant. But it the end, it was really fresh and beautiful.” Rankin couldn’t agree more. “The cover kills me… [It’s] just pure genius. They’re called makeup artists, and I think they truly are artists when they’re at the top of their game,” he enthuses while revealing that he plans on staying the beauty course: Rankin’s collaboration with Nishimura marks the second in what will be a series of five books that he is currently working on with makeup artists Caroline Saulnier, Linda Öhrström and Andrew Gallimore. “It’s a genre of photography and artistry that hasn’t been mined enough.”

Tucker Heads West For the Weekend

“When it’s time to leave Los Angeles, I realize none of us know where our shoes are,” Gaby Basora confesses of her time spent strolling the beaches of Southern California. “There’s that slower pace, much more entertaining in people’s homes and backyards, and a completely different vibe,” the Tucker designer explains of her impetus to decamp out west—albeit briefly—for a pop-up shop in Venice this weekend. Starting today, Tucker will occupy graphic designer Carly Margolis’ All for the Mountain space in L.A.’s sun-drenched west-side neighborhood. Ripe for the occasion, the line will feature pieces that have up until now only been available out of New York, including the classic and asymmetrical dress in the mint mallard print, the contrast button-up in red, and the drawstring cami dress in summery colorways. Joining forces with local talent, Basora’s silk best will be paired with Clare Vivier’s unfussy line of handbags, along with select pieces from Ariel Gordon’s semiprecious jewelry designs.

This is just the latest power play for the cheery brand since launching back in 2006. “We started really item-based as the perfect blouse and the perfect dress,” Basora says of her line, which partnered with Target for a GO International campaign in 2010. “We were bucking the trends in that we launched with a couple of items as opposed to a full collection. I think it was off-trend to do that, and now there is a lot of interest in item-driven collections.” Her full range has now filled out, moving into multiple categories (pants are a best seller in New York) as well as skewing younger with darling dresses for the younger set. And despite just opening her first stand-alone retail store in Soho at the close of 2011, the L.A. pop-up is more than just a quick sojourn out west. As Basora puts it, “We’re getting our toes in the water.”

Paris Is Still Burning

DREA EBONY was clearly feeling it. Who wouldn’t marvel at the way she flipped her hair in a circle and kicked her leg out like a Rockette as she sauntered up and down that runway in her shiny gold pants and white tank top, as cheers from the crowd grew louder and louder.

Time and time again, young kids on the transgender spectrum had graced stages almost identical to this one and been sent packing. But Drea Ebony, 18 and visiting from Pittsburgh, was different. She was a star. And she was going to prove it.
With the lights dimmed and the music blaring, Ms. Ebony flipped back in a handspring-like maneuver that ended with her landing on her back like a breakdancer. She then sprang back up, striking a pose or two or three.
“Ten. Ten. Ten. Ten. Tens across the board,” the M.C. Dashaun Wesley boomed as judges held up their scores.
Moments later, Ms. Ebony had her trophy in hand, the victor in the category of Female Figure Vogue, beating a host of other contestants from houses like LaBeija, Mugler and Evisu. “I’ve never been at an event this big,” Ms. Ebony said. “I think this is definitely the biggest one.”
Back in the 1980s, voguing and drag balls flourished in gay New York, with a brief surge in the early ’90s brought on by Madonna, Malcolm McLaren and the film “Paris Is Burning,” which chronicled the lives of several of the subculture’s most colorful inhabitants. But first came AIDS and then came hedge funds. And so the scene receded to the shadows, returning to smaller venues in Harlem and the South Bronx.
But then last month, e-mail began circulating with the news that the Xtravas (as they are known in drag ball parlance) were bringing the party to XL, a slicker-than-vinyl gay club near Times Square, in an attempt to widen the audience again.
And judging by the turnout last Sunday at the House of Xtravaganza’s 30th anniversary celebration, the effort has worked.
The downtown fashion maven Patricia Field (who was a panel judge) was there in a beige hooded Issey Miyake-esque pleated dress. The drag queen Lady Bunny sat at a table near the stage, decked out in one of her many Pucci-inspired numbers. “I’m here representing the International House of Pancakes,” she said when Mr. Wesley called her up to do a little shimmy and shake.
And the model Joan Smalls, who recently was on the cover of W, was standing on the sidelines with the fashion stylist George Cortina. The two had just finished shooting an editorial for Japanese Vogue, in which members of the House of Xtravaganza will be featured.
“He introduced me,” Ms. Smalls said while pointing to Mr. Cortina, who was wearing a tight T-shirt and jeans. “They’re so uplifting and energetic and there’s such a sense of community among them,” Ms. Smalls said. “They reinforce real family values.”
Many family members were not in attendance. Earlier, a tribute was played for Angie Xtravaganza, the ball fixture who died in 1993 of complications from AIDS. “We lost a lot of creators,” said Jose Xtravaganza, a longtime Xtravaganza and one of Madonna’s dancers during the “Vogue” era.
But this was not an evening for grieving. Instead, for over two hours, dancers competed in a variety of categories like Female Figure Face (“for boys in drag who are so beautiful they make real girls look like a dude,” said Hector Xtravaganza), Female Figure Sex Siren; Butch Queen Twister (“you come out dressed like a thug boy but then you vogue fem, like a girl,” he said) and Trans vs. Butch.
A few hundred people looked on. Occasionally, a contestant would underwhelm the judges, resulting in a dressing down. “You’ve got back,” Mr. Wesley he said to one contestant with an ample posterior but boring costume. “But this is not your category.”
Jose Xtravaganza said that if anything, the judges are too easy on people today.
“There’s all this camaraderie,” he said outside as people smoked cigarettes and caught up with old friends. “If I was battling you back when I was starting out, I didn’t hug you after. Does that make me a sore sport?” No, he said, it was about being “sure of what you’re bringing to the runway.”
His longtime dancing partner, Luis Camacho, concurred. “I have been chopped,” he said. “You live and you learn and you come back and you do it again. I would never change anything that happened. I grew up here.”
Perhaps that’s why Edwin Pabon, a freelance photographer and sometime member of the house, found the night so moving. “It’s a high school reunion,” he said as the evening wrapped up and dancers exited en masse. 

Kids Company at the RA

Being heavily invested in the business of children (had our third last month), I want to bring attention to the forthcoming Kids Company event hosted by the Royal Academy of Arts.

Entitled 'Child Hood - The Real Event', it is an exhibition showcasing paintings, sculpture and poetry by children living in some of the most deprived areas of London. While we are all going Olympic crazy over the next couple of months, it's worth pondering the achievements of these children who have overcome a very different kind of challenge.

Carine Roitfeld generates hype for CR Fashion Book

Carine Roitfeld unveiled the first full fashion image from her eagerly awaited CR Fashion Book online July 23, with Dutch fashion model Juliet Ingleby starring in the dramatic shoot.

The first issue of the former French Vogue editor's semiannual magazine, set to retail at $9.95, will be launched September 13, with half of the distribution to be in Europe and the rest across Asia and the US.

In the new image Ingleby wanders through a cemetery wearing a billowing lavender veil, with the latter moving in the breeze thanks to animated GIF (Graphics Interchange Format).

Roitfeld is gradually building hype for the new publication, which will be officially feted with a launch during New York Fashion Week.

Since departing from French Vogue in January last year, Roitfeld has kept busy working on projects including a book with Karl Lagerfeld on Chanel's iconic little black jacket, penning a tome on her career called Carine Roitfeld: Irreverent, as well as styling gigs for the likes of department store Barneys New York and guest-editing publications including VMan.

She is best known for the often provocative and boundary-pushing imagery seen in French Vogueduring her time at the helm, although speaking earlier in the year the fashion expert insisted she would be finding "new ways to be irreverent" when styling shoots for CR.

The magazine's name is inspired by her handwritten initials which adorned the monthly editor's letter for the period that she helmed French Vogue.

Super Bowl tickets from a pair of dice?

Is it possible to take a common pair of blue dice, randomly sitting on a man's coffee table, andturn them into a pair of Super Bowl tickets?Super Bowl tickets from a pair of dice?We're about to find out.

Sam Annable, who works as a sales executive for a minor-league baseball team, has launched a campaign to trade up from a pair of dice, again and again, until he has Super Bowl tickets. He then plans to give those tickets to a sick child who has yet to be chosen.

If the plan sounds familiar, it's because Annable was inspired by One Red Paperclip, the story of a guy who turned an oversized red paperclip into a house through a series of trades. His first trade was for a giant fish pen.

Annable's already ahead of the curve, as he's flipped the dice for an Alex Rodriguez rookie card, which he then flipped for a baseball glove made for Ike Davis of the New York Mets.

From pjstar.com, here's what Annable said about his motivation and methods:

"I got to thinking about how dice represent chance, risk," Annable said. "And I thought about how these really sick children deal with odds, face risk every time they go through surgeries or treatments.

"I decided I wanted to dedicate a project to send one of them to the Super Bowl."

It's a wonderful notion, but he's got a long way to go. The Ike Davis glove is valued at $300 - $400. Last year, the average Super Bowl ticket was in the neighborhood of $4,000. He's got time, though, and he'll probably get a lot of help from the kindness of strangers.